Kodiaks seeking success at ACAC men’s volleyball championship

By Lethbridge Herald on February 26, 2026.

Nathan Reiter

Lethbridge Herald

It all comes down to this weekend.

The Lethbridge Polytechnic Kodiaks will travel to Red Deer for the ACAC men’s volleyball championship, beginning tonight when they take on the NAIT Ooks in the quarterfinal.

Head coach Greg Gibos says reaching the championship was a goal for Lethbridge at the start of the season.

“Any chance you get to go, it’s special. We’re in a really hard conference and we’re in a really hard division of that conference. I think seven of the last nine winners of ACACs have come from the South, so we definitely know that every year in the South, it’s really tough to get out of. I think this is nine straight for us, so it’s nice to be there again. At the end of the year, all we can ask for is to be playing meaningful volleyball at the end of February, and this is where we are.”

Lethbridge finished third in the ACAC south division with a 13-6 record and will match up with the NAIT Ooks who finished second in the north division with a 14-5 record.

NAIT is also playing host to the CCAA national men’s volleyball championship next month. As a result, the Ooks have assembled a veteran roster to give themselves the best chance to win a national title on home court.

Gibos says Lethbridge and NAIT have been familiar opponents come ACAC tournament time in recent years. 

“This is the fourth year in a row we’ve seen them in the quarterfinals. Two programs that definitely know a lot about each other. I think that goes a long way for our young athletes, where it’s like, we’ve seen their best athletes play in big moments. We know a lot of their tendencies and a lot of what they’re going to want to do, specifically against our team as well. I think they’ve got 11 fifth years. They’ve at least gone through the league and seen these guys a lot over the last three or four years. I’m sure they’re going to have some evolution, some changes in their game to keep us on our toes. But I think that’s one big thing is it’s a known commodity for a young group. We can come in with a decent game plan and some ability to control some of the things we want to control this week.”

The ACAC championships run in a single elimination format. If the Kodiaks win, they would advance to face the winner of Augustana and Red Deer in the semi-final. If they lose, their season comes to an end.

With the pressure high right from the start, Gibos says Lethbridge will look to rely on some of their experiences from late in the regular season.

“I think we’ve actually had to play with our backs against the wall a little bit here in the second semester. Going into that Olds weekend, we knew that if we lost both games that weekend, then we might not be going to championships at all. For us, we’re just excited to get there. We want these moments, these are the moments that we play for are the moments that we know we want to inspire our community with. I think our guys are just so excited to get up there regardless of if it’s win or go home. We’ve accomplished a lot of things this year and one match doesn’t define our whole season and these athletes know that.”

It will be the final ACAC championship for fifth year Kodiak libero Malcolm Fisher. The former LCI Ram signed with the Kodiaks ahead of the 2018-19 season and took a couple years of hiatus during his tenure with Lethbridge. 

When asked what Lethbridge will need to do to have success, Fisher pointed out the fine details in the game.

“We constantly need to be bettering that ball, whether that’s like a bad pass and it’s making a better set and then going for like your best shot. I think that’s just what it comes down to. It’s all the little things starting from coverage, communication and serve receive from the service line. I think it’s all like all aspects of this game that we need to do well. There’s going to be times that  we don’t do those things well. But I think it’s just relying on our teammates to better that ball.”

The Kodiaks and Ooks begin at 8 p.m. Other games on the slate Thursday have Northwestern taking on Briercrest, Ambrose versus Keyano and Augustana taking on the host Red Deer Polytechnic Kings.